


Cardamom and Cloves

by wolframbeta



Series: Like Water, Like Stone: Drabbles, Ficlets, Miscellanea [3]
Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: Angst, Established Relationship, F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-11
Updated: 2020-04-11
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:15:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,505
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23591446
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wolframbeta/pseuds/wolframbeta
Summary: Liara takes the night off from her duties as an information broker on Illium to share a meal and quiet conversation. Lost in her past, it doesn't go according to plan.
Relationships: Female Shepard/Liara T'Soni
Series: Like Water, Like Stone: Drabbles, Ficlets, Miscellanea [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1734658
Comments: 22
Kudos: 41





	Cardamom and Cloves

"For here or to go, Miss?"

Liara opened her mouth to answer when a notification chimed at her wrist. With a tap she silenced her omni-tool, adding a few additional gestures to bring up the holo interface and activate privacy mode, ensuring no external interruptions until the next morning.

"Sorry, for here," she said, waving away the display, pressing her lips into a tight smile.

It was a rare occurrence that she shielded herself from her work, choosing to ignore the data packets and varied correspondences trickling in after hours. The weight of obligation lifted, her forced smile loosened into something natural and brighter. She smoothed the front of her dress, imagined — without having to turn to look — the wide-eyed enthusiasm with which Shepard ogled at the display of sweets and baked goods in the nearby window, and finalized her payment with a sweep of her omni-tool's wristband over the detector.

"Table for…?"

"Two."

"There's an open table right over there."

With a knowing glance toward the dessert counter she beckoned Shepard to follow her, peeling her away from the tarts (apricot and fig varieties, today), the golden eggwash-glazed _gata_ , the trays of baklava glistening with syrup, the dainty spiced cookies and muffins flaked with sliced almonds.

It was a more casual dining experience than she normally would have opted for given the occasion, but with even her office work bleeding late into the night her options for dine-in were limited — this wasn't the Wards, after all. A restaurant open this late on Illium was the exception, not the rule, and it was a lucky coincidence this particular spot was open.

The restaurant was fairly new, and she'd received a ping on her omni-tool when it had first opened, the menu offerings having contained a key word she'd set an application to track on the off chance it were to come up. She'd been terribly surprised that it did — believed it to be a mistake at first, given Illium's relatively small human population and the obscurity of her query.

She'd pushed that notification to the back of her mind. Noted the restaurant's location so she could walk alternate routes home after finalizing her day's work at her office. If she were to pass it, even accidentally, she knew it would tug at her, but it was a temptation she knew she had to refuse until the time was right.

The days crept by on her calendar.

Calendars, to be more specific.

Detailed Illium and Thessian calendars sat side by side in her timekeeping widget docked to her omni-tool's homepage. Below them, minimized for quick at-a-glance viewing, were both the Citadel and Alliance standards. It was a habit she couldn't quite break, checking the turning of the Earth days with respect to her own, the continued sentimentality outweighing the lack of practicality.

Day after Illium day, she climbed the stairs to her office above the Nos Astra trading floor, tea in hand, mind already chasing every thread and task to be completed. She slouched over her terminals and datapads. Straightened her posture, hardened her jaw, and smoothed her coat lapels in preparation for video calls. Negotiated. Threatened, when necessary. Sighed heavily as she cut the feed. Slouched over her work again.

Tasale dipped down below the clouds and painted her office walls in a twilit gradient of glowing amber and indigo shadows. The NAE closing bell sounded and the electric buzz of activity below dissipated into muted chatter. As late night crept forward, she rubbed her strained eyes, shut down all her terminals, and turned off the office lights.

She blinked into the glow of her omni-tool, orange blooming above her wrist in the darkness.

She exhaled and waved the calendars away.

The time was right.

Shepard gazed at Liara across their small table for two, lips hinting at a gentle, lopsided grin as she tore a small piece of flatbread off for herself and contemplated which dip to try first.

Liara smiled abashedly and bowed her head.

Delicate cups rattled on matching saucers as their server approached.

"Your coffee," she said, setting the cups and saucers down on the table, followed by the _jazve_ filled with the fresh, steaming brew. "Careful, it's very hot. Only touch the handle."

"Thank you," Liara offered.

"Enjoy! Your food should be out shortly."

Liara poured her own coffee, then half-stood from her seat to reach Shepard's cup.

"You know," Liara said, "I was skeptical at first, but I'm glad I took the time to do this." She paused, eyeing the level of the coffee's caramel-toned froth as she filled Shepard's cup, then looked earnestly at her. "I owe it to you." She didn't break eye contact as she set the _jazve_ aside and sat back down in her seat.

Shepard cocked her head and chuckled wryly. "You don't owe me anything, Liara. You know I'm always here for you. Good times. Bad times. If our schedules align, you're a priority to me."

Liara rotated her coffee cup in its saucer, tracing her fingertip over the painted design running its circumference, bright colors and silver plating in the form of paisley and pomegranates. Shepard's endearing crooked grin lingered in her mind, uplifting as it was bittersweet. She sighed to ease the pressure in her chest as she scratched at the cup's silver design with her fingernail.

"I get so caught up in my work that I forget to take time for the things that truly bring me comfort. I'm sorry."

"You don't need to apologize," Shepard said, softly. "Really, I understand."

Shepard set her coffee cup back down on its saucer, the sound a bright clink. Liara took it as her cue to taste her own.

She never could acquire a taste for coffee during her time aboard the _Normandy_. Cream or no cream, sweetened or not, some brews were bitter and lingered with acidic bite on her tongue while others held sour notes despite otherwise lacking in flavor. 

Shepard always laughed at the way she wrinkled her nose upon her first sip.

"I've tasted Earl Grey at your preferred strength," she would say, "so it's not the tannins you object to. The rocket fuel we drink on this ship gives a real caffeine kick, but I'll be the first to admit it doesn't have much going for it in the flavor department. I should take you out for _real_ coffee someday."

And she did.

With time to kill before their transport departed for Thessia — a well deserved and much anticipated shore leave they booked as soon as Shepard signed her discharge papers from Huerta Memorial — they wandered the Presidium's limited grounds, its pockets of normalcy scattered between cordoned off destruction scheduled for expedited repair. Despite the scuffed and dented floors, walls marred with smoke and bullet holes, for the most part, there was an odd air of business as usual.

As if the remains of a destroyed Reaper hadn't littered the area only days before.

Halfway through their walk, they paused in the shadow of a row of fountainside trees beside a small, mobile food cart. Its sign declared in neon banners of holographic text:

  
Geth What? We're Open!  
A Mid-East Feast That Can't Be Beat!  


Shepard made her order flashing sidelong smiles at Liara, absolutely elated at her find and rocking on her heels with barely contained excitement. The cook prepared the coffee then procured two sweets from the baked goods display.

Treat in hand, Liara followed Shepard to a bench beneath the trees.

"On Earth, the only onomatopoetic word for coffee is in Armenian," Shepard explained, holding up her coffee. "This is Armenian coffee. _Surj_. It sounds like slurping, I guess."

Liara held the disposable cup to her face and let the steam tickle her nose.

Shepard chuckled at Liara's hesitation. "Try it! If you don't like it, more for me."

Liara took a sip. The coffee was rich — unfiltered, the powdery grounds boiled directly in water — and delightfully sweet. She raised her eyebrows.

"I have a feeling you'll try to steal some of my baklava, though." Shepard winked. "I know how you are about desserts."

The delicate paper-thin layers of dough, the flavor of the spice mingling with the nuts, and the richness of the syrup were altogether irresistible as promised. Fortunately, Shepard didn't require too much convincing to surrender part of her piece.

Snack finished, ship to Thessia soon commencing boarding procedures, they walked side by side, the bounce in their steps due only in part to the Presidium ring's light gravity, brushing shoulders and arms with suggestive smirks and intertwining fingers still sticky with syrup. Their laughter was airy and as sweet as their dessert all the way to the docking bay's elevator.

"You know," Shepard said over a stifled chuckle as the elevator door closed. "I think it's sacrilege to make baklava with honey. It's too heavy and overpowering."

Cheeks still aching with laughter, Liara raised a quizzical eyebrow to accompany her open-mouth smile.

"Simple syrup — that's one part water, two parts sugar," Shepard continued, grinning smugly, "finished with a hint of rosewater and lemon to gently marry with the layers of phyllo and nuts flavored with cardamom and cloves… that's how it should be."

"Stop talking," Liara said, lunging forward. She kissed Shepard hard, pressing her body against hers upon the elevator wall. Lips parting, she pulled her closer, hooking her fingers in her beltloops as her tongue skimmed past her teeth.

Shepard leaned out of their kiss, slightly. "Well, fuck," she said between breaths. "I didn't realize I could get you all hot and bothered with my culinary —"

_"Shhh!"_ Liara palmed her cheek, bringing their lips together again. Kissed her passionately, then more subdued, arms wrapping her waist and keeping her close even as their lips drifted apart and the bittersweet taste of coffee faded.

Shepard let out a sigh and cupped Liara's face in her hand, bringing their foreheads together. "You know, I thought it was a frivolous splurge at first, but I am suddenly finding myself _really_ glad you booked us a private room on that transport."

"Mmmm," Liara agreed with a devious grin, and pecked a gentle kiss on her cheek.

"You're really fucking rude, regardless." Shepard smirked as her hands settled on Liara's hips. "If there's cameras in here, next thing we know everyone will be talking about how _Commander Shepard, Savior of the Citadel"_ — she rolled her eyes to accompany the mocking, derisive voice she used for that epithet — "is a bulldagger and a xenophile who can't keep it in her pants for more than a femtosecond."

Back on Illium, an omni-tool chimed. Liara's mind snapped away from the Citadel. She set her coffee cup down and tapped her wrist.

Her omni-tool's normally bright display was dim and transparent and its colors muted. The pop-up message on the interface asked if she wanted to manually disable privacy mode or keep the scheduled 07:00 deactivation she'd set previously.

"Is everything alright, Li?" Shepard's voice was low.

The chime sounded again. A matron at a nearby table waved a hand over the blinking light at her wrist, brow furrowed. Summoning an obnoxiously large display — its various panels spanning double the length of her forearm — she proceeded to type furiously, fingers flying over the holographic keyboard hovering before her.

Liara sucked on her lips as she waved away her 'tool. "I just thought you'd have more to say after all this time."

"Do you want to get our food to go? Eat back at the apartment instead?"

"No, no. I'd rather stay," Liara said, clasping her hands on the table in front of her. She rubbed her thumbs together and looked at Shepard sidelong. "A change of scenery… is not something I often get."

The words ached as she uttered them, her throat threatening to close as a hollow desire clamped down on her chest. A desire to be held, to let the tears that welled behind the fortified dam of practiced stoicism spill freely, soaking the fabric of Shepard's shirt as she pressed her cheek against her, breathing in her scent and listening to the sound of her heartbeat and the resonance of her voice as she spoke words of comfort.

She wanted nothing more than to be back at her apartment, to crumple in a heap of exhaustion and sorrow onto her bed in the security of Shepard's embrace. To shed the facade of the steely eyed information broker and admit she was _lost_.

"Petra?" Liara said meekly.

Shepard's expression softened. She set down her coffee.

"Your food, Miss?"

Liara snapped out of her singular focus.

She turned toward the server's voice and straightened her posture. Removed her arms from the table.

"Thank you," she mumbled, as the plates and bowls of stew, pilaf, and side dishes were set before her. She hastily spooned a helping of everything onto her plate as soon as the server turned to leave.

Despite the hour — well after midnight, Nos Astra time — the restaurant's quiet lull she'd arrived in on gave way to a bubble of activity, a couple new groups arriving, pushing tables together to accommodate their numbers.

Having skipped lunch and, technically, dinner, sustenance was at the forefront of Liara's mind. With her own conversation paused as she ate, the warmth of ambient chatter around her was a welcome distraction.

"Liara?" Shepard ventured, tentatively.

She thought of taking another bite of food, but set her fork down instead. "Yes?"

"You were going to ask me something?"

The worry weighed in Shepard's eyes as she rubbed the back of her neck and ran a hand through her hair. The short strands stuck up at odd angles where her fingers had passed through.

Liara suppressed an impulse to reach out across the table, to flatten the newly disheveled spikes of Shepard's hair, to trail her finger down and feel the prickle of the undercut she kept so neatly buzzed. But she only stared at her, gawking, the ache in her chest renewed as she longed for contact, for the simple comfort of physical touch that she had been waiting for, day after day, in her unbearable solitude.

She shouldn't have come here.

Should have taken her food to go.

"Hey, are you going to be using that chair?"

Liara peeled her attention away from her meal, from Shepard, and turned toward the voice. "What?"

Her eyes scanned up and down at a young man in an ill-fitting suit.

"The chair." He gestured to the seat across from her. "We need an extra, if you're not using it."

"Oh." She shook her head. "No, I'm not using it," she murmured, eyes glazed, staring unseeing.

He extended his hands, palms up, seemingly indicating the spread of uneaten food and the untouched coffee across from Liara. "Stood up? That's unfortunate. Hang in there, buddy."

_Buddy?_ She bowed her head and pinched the bridge of her nose as the man lugged the chair back to his group. _Illium humans. So entitled. So presumptuous._

She continued to rub her nose, then her forehead. Cradled her chin in her hands, elbows on the table, staring at nothing, sitting wholly silent, wholly still.

"Do you need something, my friend?" The server's voice broke her out of her reverie once again.

Liara contemplated for a moment. "If I may ask… about your desserts. What type of syrup do you use on your baklava?"

"It's a rosewater syrup," the server replied, tone chipper. "It's really quite good."

"I'll take two pieces."

"That's a good choice. Baklava always makes things better." She seemed to cringe at herself for acknowledging Liara's demeanor and paused almost imperceptibly before adding, "Do you want that for here or to go?"

Liara looked at the vacant space across from her, the barely eaten meal for two, the cup of coffee, now gone cold.

"Everything. Everything to go."

⁂

It was never truly dark in Nos Astra.

Tonight, like most nights, the city's light pollution hovered in the sky with a restless glow, trapped beneath a thick blanket of clouds. The humid air, choking and heavy with the scent of imminent storm, every so often wafted to Liara's nose with the hint of the leftovers in her bag, its handle slung over her shoulder as she walked the vacant streets.

She approached her apartment and palmed the lock. The door slid shut behind her with a dull thunk.

She collapsed onto the couch.

For all her ability to retreat into her memories, to build an illusion and _believe_ it, she did herself no favors in pretending that Petra Shepard hadn't died on May 29, 2183 amidst the backdrop of space as her suit depressurized over Alchera. Tears stained her cheeks as she let herself slip into the memory she constructed for her, of her final moments falling away from the wreckage of her ruined ship, the bitter panic giving way to serenity as her brain was starved of oxygen. How beautiful it must have been — the curve of the planet, the brilliant gradient of its atmosphere, swirls of clouds and marbled blue spiraling below and set against a black void dotted with stars — as her higher thought processes dwindled and her conciousness faded into the bliss of hypoxia.

How insulted she would feel knowing Liara summoned bits of her mind — scattered and faint but very much living on after their joining — for even a small chance at comfort. As if it somehow negated the fact that while she drowned herself in coffee and memories, it was her own fault Shepard's body sat dissected in some Cerberus lab because of a sick, misguided fantasy and naive delusion that she was doing the right thing.

Liara wouldn't forgive herself for what she'd done. Shepard never could.

A chime sounded at Liara's wrist, accompanied by a small vibration. Her stomach lurched. 

She was brought back to the darkness of her apartment, the only sound the gentle pattering of rain at her window.

A hollow, empty space.

Her omni-tool continued to flash in her peripheral vision. It chimed again.

No external message should have been pushed through until the morning. It was an internal alert — one she'd presumably set herself, and set to high priority.

She didn't recall doing so. Was certain that she hadn't.

There was nothing — _nothing_ — she needed help being reminded of today.

Any other day, she would have ordered her food to go.

  
Received: 11 April 2184 at 00:00  
Sent: 03 May 2183 at 21:03  
Alliance HQ Standard Time (Arcturus Station)  
[Tap to convert to local time: Nos Astra, Illium]

Liaraaaa!!!1

I told you you were gonna regret letting me tinker with your omni-tool. How's this for a blast from the past: it's mid-morning in Armali and I'm currently lounging on the bed of our breezy little Thessian beachfront bungalow wearing not a whole lot (either no pants or no shirt, I'll leave that up to your imagination and/or memory) while you're out plucking limpets and whatnot from the rocks outside to use for some seafood salad that's gonna taste like salty eezo, so, yum! Really looking forward to that! That's not sarcasm, either! I'm sure it'll be great.

Anyway, I'm lounging on the bed tinkering with your omni-tool because I'm good at this shit and you asked me to. I fixed it in ten seconds and now I'm bored, so, surprise message time it is! I embedded this message in a fairly sophisticated and highly undetectable virus (it's mostly benign (actually, fully benign, I'm not that mean)) so I'm sorry! About that! But I also wanted to make sure you couldn't find it before it was time.

Guess what today is? (I mean the day you're receiving this, not the lounging-on-the-bed-in-a-breezy-Thessian-beachfront-bungalow-wearing-only-my-boxers-and-tinkering-with-your-omni-tool day.) That's right! April 11, my birthday! I'm reminding you because you said you hate "That Earth Calendar." You should give me a smooch if I'm nearby. And if I'm not, give me a smooch ASAP, by any and all means necessary. That's an order.

But that's enough about me. 

In all seriousness… writing this now, I know I've only known you for four months. But those four months have been the craziest and the best of my life. Thanks, in no small part, to you. I know it probably seems like the blink of an eye from your perspective, but it's time enough for me to realize you mean the world to me. (Maybe even multiple worlds! I've yet to decide which ones.)

As you're reading this, almost a year has passed. We're back on the Normandy, fighting the good fight. Our week in Armali is a distant memory (for me at least, I know you asari have some crazy memory things going on). Extrapolating from four months of data… I can tell you, my dearest future-Liara, that I love you as much as I did that day and probably even more than I ever thought possible. And I really want you to know that.

Thank you. For everything.

-Shep  


**Author's Note:**

> Takes place between Chapters 1 and 3 of _Beneath Our Darkened Skies_ (Book 2 of _Like Water, Like Stone_ ).
> 
> As this was written for a friendly angst competition, this work has not been beta'd. All mistakes are my own. 
> 
> Prompt was "X or Y."


End file.
